Charlotte Perkins Gilman-Sociologists, feminist, lecturer of social reform
Utopian feminist (Herland)
“The Yellow Wallpaper”: postpartum psychosis, S. Weir Mitchell & rest cure
She felt like a communal type of housing would allow individuals to live singly but have companionship also.
She thought it was a good idea to remove the kitchen from the home, so it’s not about the labor.
S. Weir Mitchell & rest cure: If some women were doing intellectual work, that it would burn them out; you couldn’t read, write, and couldn’t engage in intellectual conversations.
Tragic childhood: father abandoned them, left them impoverished; often in the presence of aunts; one aunty was Harriet Beecher Stowe (Uncle Tom’s Cabin).
At age five, she taught herself to read, her mother was not affectionate because she didn’t want her kids to get hurt like she did.
Live a childhood of isolation but she frequently visited the local library.
Spent her youth in Providence, Rhode Island; went to seven different public school and had to drop out at the age of 15.
1884: Marriage to Charles Stetson
1885: Birth of only daughter, Katherine Beecher Stetson; caused postpartum depression.
1887: Wrote in diary that she was sick with what she called a brain disease; was not allowed to do anything.
After nine weeks, she was sent home.
1888: Separated from her husband & moved to Pasadena, CA
1894: Legally divorced
1894: Katherine returned to the East to live with her
